jason pettus [metafeed]

Please note that this site has been shut down by its owner, in order to use his del.icio.us account to post the same type of material much more quickly and efficiently. The site is being left up for archival purposes, but it should be considered as a "dead" one, with no plans for new content to appear here again.

Saturday, August 20, 2005

Live from Humboldt Park: Interview with Katherine Hodges

I'm in Humboldt Park, attending an after-party for the Quimby's event we were all just at, held at the apartment of the event's organizer, Katherine Hodges and her boyfriend Shag. Here, Katherine tells us how she thought tonight's event went - but much more importantly, why they decided to serve mint juleps at tonight's event (which all of us partook of heartily), and where they came up with the recipe.

Live from Wicker Park: Random chat with Kate and Joshua

I'm still at Quimby's Bookstore, in Wicker Park. Here, we start with the last twenty seconds of a poem my friend Kate is reading to my friend Josh; then, Kate tells us about her new book, while Josh cracks wise. Viva la mint juleps!

Live from Wicker Park: Interview with Jonathan Messinger

The show at Quimby's is now over, and here's a five-minute interview I did afterwards with Jonathan Messinger, "The Hardest Working Man in Show Business." Jonathan is the organizer of the Hideout series of live literary events, plus is the webmaster of This Is Grand (user-submitted true stories about Chicago transit), plus is the Books Editor of Time Out Chicago. Whew! Here, a bit of talk about how he finds the time, how one actually gets a job at a place like Time Out, and how it is that every single person in Chicago's artistic community knows who Jonathan is.

Live from Wicker Park: Smoke break during Quimby's show

Three and a half minute monologue, recorded on the sidewalk outside of Quimby's Bookstore "soundscape" style, while drinking a mint julep and talking about the podcasts I'm listening to these days and why I'm listening to them. More audio reports later tonight.

Live from Wicker Park: Interview with Jenna of "You Knit WHAT?!"

I'm at the beginning of my long evening in Wicker Park; first, drinks and appetizers with my friend Jenna, of snarky You Knit WHAT?! fame. Here, a five-minute soundscape tour of Wicker Park's central section: we almost get hit at the North and Damen intersection; Jenna talks about her snarky website a little; we pass the building where "MTV's The Real World: Chicago" was filmed, and we both throw up some snarky comments. Many more audio reports to come tonight!

Friday, August 12, 2005

Field report: Chicago Small Business Expo

Greetings from the red line, where am just heading home after attending my first Chicago Small Business Expo, down at the campus of the University of Illinois - Chicago. And what an event it was, man! Held at least once a year, the Expo is in fact a free event, open to any random Chicago citizen who wants to register, mainly sponsored and put together by the Office of the Treasurer.

Such events, as some of you already know, can sometimes be a mixed bag; I've attended such free "community" events before, both here and in other cities, where there ended up not being much worth seeing beyond half a dozen folding tables and a bunch of bored-looking interns. The Expo I just attended, however, was quite different - it was held at UIC's basketball stadium in this case, and in fact needed that kind of room, with just hundreds upon hundreds of vendors and government agencies in attendance. I met up with banks today, small-business advocacy groups, third-party payroll companies, marketing and advertising agencies, independent auditors - just about any business you could imagine that has something to do with small business and entrepreneurship. Plus the Expo also sponsored a whole series of free workshops throughout the day as well, several of which I attended and found most informative.

So what was the most interesting experience of the day? Well, that would probably be the presentation by Scott Bruner, director of Chicago's brand-new Department of Business Affairs and Licensing. This is an agency that was just created last year for the first time, and will officially be opening their doors for business come October 1; the whole idea (spurred by Mayor Daley, of course) is to consolidate all the different licensing processes the city requires for businesses under one roof, with one shared staff that can help walk you through the whole process. So, if you need a liquor license, an outdoor-seating license, a food-handling license, a live-entertainment license, come October you'll be able to go to one office and apply for them all (compared to before, when you would have to visit three or four different agencies to get all the relevant applications), and also have one government employee who's familiar with all the different licenses and can help you streamline the application process. (In fact, I specifically asked, and this new department is promising to get the process of procuring a Chicago liquor license down to 45 days, from the two years or so it takes currently.) And here's even more intriguing news - according to Bruner, come this point a year from now, you will be able to apply online for just about every license the city grants. Well, hooray for government employees who embrace the web, man!

Anyway, more details on Monday at my personal journal; I just wanted to drop a line now and let you know how everything went, and to thank the city for putting together such a great, informative event. Thanks, Chicago Office of the Treasurer!

Audio report: Chicago Small Business Expo

I'm attending the Chicago Small Business Expo today, down at the UIC Pavilion. Here, a four-minute audio report on how the day is going, recorded on my cellphone as I was standing in line for lunch. Written report later today!

Live from the Chicago Small Business Expo

I'm reporting live today from the Chicago Small Business Expo, down at UIC. Here, waiting for the next workshop to start, this one on the various financing options available to small-business wannabes like myself.

Live from the Chicago Small Business Expo

I'm reporting today from the Chicago Small Business Expo, down at UIC; here, just killing a few minutes before the next workshop. Man, would you just look at how nice the UIC student center is? We didn't have anything nearly as nice at the U of Missouri, where I went to school.

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